COVID-19: Hitler versus Trump

Well, this is May 2 and I'm still doing this daily.  I'll continue through this new coronavirus pandemic.

From Worldometer, I continue this table to show how new deaths best determine the phase of COVID-19:

DAY     China   Italy   USA   Spain   Germany   S. Korea  WORLD

Apr  21         ?    534   1481      430            86               1        5362

        22         ?    437     931      435          125               1        5008
        23         ?    464   1435      440            54               2        5033
        24         0?  420     718      367            78               0?      4200
        25         0?  415   1073      378            59               0?      4650
        26         0?  260     779      288            19               2        3102
        27         1    333     762      331              9               1        2816
        28         0?  382   1065      301            48               1        2983
        29         0?  323   1374      453            62               2        8471
        30         0    285   1789      268          105               1        5291   
May   1         0    269   1163      281            39               1        4260
          2         0    474     887      276              ?                2       3576

Summary:

• The World and USA show a nice down trend in new deaths.  
• China had one new cases, but the World had 58,129 and USA 16,328.
• However, yesterday China had 12, World 94,550 and USA 36,007.  Why this sudden drop in cases in just one day?
• One reason is that the table above apparently does not represent the true statistics for that day.  All these numbers go up throughout the day.  For example, when I click on the Yesterday link, I don't get World new deaths of 4260, but see instead 5624, while for the USA not 887, but 1,897.
• I'm thus will use this Worldometer report and be one day late to get the true numbers for that day.   Thus, the above table will now begin to read:

DAY     China   Italy   USA   Spain   Germany   S. Korea  WORLD

May   1         0    269   1897      281          113               1        5624
          2         (to come tomorrow)

Shifting to my subject of day, Hitler.  Why?  Last night on Netflix I watched a 2 hr 30 min 1977 documentary:  Hitler:  A Career.  Rotten Tomatoes audiences rated it at 77%.  Of course, I already knew a lot about him, but this film had amazing scenes and photos of his speeches and relationships, a few in color.  It was fascinating and brutal.  

I kept relating Hitler to Donald Trump and me.  A lot to Trump and only one link to me, which was art.  Hitler truly was interested in the fine arts and for a while sold his watercolors.  In college I took a variety of art courses, like watercolor, oil and color.  In my senior year, most of my close friends had plans to join the Peace Corps.  I had three choices:  a chemical engineer in industry, a sacrifice job to help Hawaii in the sugar industry (sort of my Peace Corps) and to study art in Japan.  My life would have been totally different if I did not take the humanitarian pathway.

It's not totally clear why Hitler hated Jews.  Partly because he was probably an illegitimate child of a Jew, and perhaps because he caught a venereal disease from a Jewish prostitute.

His image was one of a celibate totally dedicated to Make Germany Great Again.  Sound like Trump?  In reality, Adolf had four relationships, and all either succeeded or tried to kill herself.  He finally married Eva Braun just before they both committed suicide.  Donald has only been married three times, but this current one can't be on the right track.

Worst or most evil world leader of all time?  The most prominent on those lists is Hitler.

Worst U.S. president ever?  George Bush the younger and Richard Nixon usually place somewhere.  However, the absolutely most terrible will someday soon be Donald Trump.  The Washington Post says #1, and before this pandemic he was already #3 by the Siena College Research Institute.

I've never seen back to back two movies of greater contrast.  The second film I watched was the 2015 Look Who's Back?  Rotten Tomatoes audiences rated it at 80%.  Critics said a humorous movie with a very serious message and irreverent humor of surprising significance.  This was a German satirical comedy where the real Hitler somehow puffs back into modern reality just above the bunker where he died, which is now a small park.  Played by Oliver Masucci (who can now be found in Dark, Netflix's first German-language original series--hey, 94%/94% by Rotten Tomatoes).

Regular Germans see him walking around and think this is some kind of joke.  So much so that he becomes popular on television.  Hitler then realizes that he failed the first time, but learns to use the internet to Make Germany Great Again.  I'm not making this up.  This Hitler is the epitome of Donald Trump.  Except Trump does not come across as funny.  Then again, maybe you can take his actions as just that, which is the case in this production.

So Hitler writes a book which becomes a movie:

Once the work for his film finishes, Hitler senses that he is on the path to a political comeback. He is more popular than ever, and nationalist Germans give him hope that Germany may be ready for his return to power. With Hitler and Bellini riding in the back seat of an open Mercedes-Benz W31 convertible and among images of actual nationalist demonstrations, the film ends with Hitler's words, "I can work with this".

By the way, there is a book by Burt Neuborn entitled:

When at Times the Mob Is Swayed: A Citizen’s Guide to Defending Our Republic

Neuborn is a prominent civil liberties lawyer, and he describes Trump copying Adolf Hitler's rhetoric and policies.

The Herald-Star lists these similarities:

• Attack the judiciary and rule of law.
• Attack the media.
• Degrade anyone who disagrees with them.
• Denigrate immigrants.
• Demonize political opponents.
• Hitler provided the masses with a radio receiving only one channel.  Trump tweets and permits only one media network to be viewed by our military, Fox.
• Neither was elected by a majority.
• Trump gave windfalls to large corporations.  Hitler despised the labor movement.

Here is Billboard's #1 hits of 1970, in seven minutes.  The Chemical Engineering Department at LSU was next to Tiger Stadium.  You need to live in a place like this to appreciate the allegiance and fealty of football fans.  A normal person can only go to a game through inheritance.  Students have a large section.  Death Valley games were only at night, and the crowd mostly came drunk from elaborate tailgates, usually dressed in sport coat and tie, gowns for females.  Pete Maravich also was an attraction.  The first black basketball player here became the first in the entire league.  While there were few Asians on campus, I'm wondering now if I saw any African-American student.

I end with Queen and Adam Lambert dedicating YOU are the Champions to applaud the efforts of COVID-19 frontline workers.

Oh, a resident where I live sent me this clip which is just perfect for the subject matter of the day.  I guess they have upgraded the Hitler Rants Parodies.  Worthy of your time.

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